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Philippines, 03 May 2024 |
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Crawford vs. Ugas June or July 2022? Maybe! By Ralph Rimpell PhilBoxing.com Wed, 05 Jan 2022  On November 20, 2021 WBO welterweight champion Terrence Crawford (38-0, 29KOs) defeated former two time welterweight champion Shawn Porter by stopping him in the 10th round of their scheduled 12 round fight. The Porter fight was significant for two reasons. The first reason was because Boxing Critics have always cited that the level of Crawford’s opposition has been inferior. Second reason is because the fight was the last contractual fight with Bob Arum’s Top Rank, Crawford’s former Promoter. Crawford can now pick and choose any Promoter he wants to do business with long term, short term, remain a free agent and sign for one fight at a time, or even form his own Promotional team and Promote himself. The fight the Boxing world desperately wants to see is Crawford face his fellow welterweight counterpart Errol Spence (27-0, 21KOs) who holds the WBC/IBF version of the welterweight title to determine who the best fighter is. The consensus reason why Crawford vs. Spence could not be signed was because both fighters were represented by two different Promoters. Crawford was previously promoted by Bob Arum’s Top Rank, and Spence by Premier Boxing Champions headed by the Al Haymon. After Crawford defeated Porter, he immediately made it clear once again that he wanted to fight Spence for his next fight. Spence had been scheduled to fight future Boxing Hall of Famer Manny Pacquiao in August 2021, but Spence was diagnosed with a detached retina to his Left eye during a routine physical by the Nevada State Athletic commission and was forced to withdraw from the Pacquioa fight. Spence went on to have successful eye surgery and was eventually cleared to resume training and his career. Spence has since announced he will return in March or April 2022 against his replacement in the Pacquiao fight, fellow WBA welterweight champion Yordenis Ugas (27-4, 12KOs). Thus far, no reason was given why Spence opted to fight Ugas instead of Crawford. Some are saying that Crawford is not a financial draw as his former Promoter Top Rank Boss, Bob Arum, has stated. Arum has gone on record to say that he has lost money on all of the Crawford fights he promoted. Crawford can’t be blamed entirely for the lack of financial revenue because marquee fighters with big names that can help sell Pay Per View (PPV) were reluctant to fight Crawford in the past or have reportedly outpriced their selves during negotiations by asking for a ridiculous amount of money to face Crawford. It’s obvious that the Spence vs. Ugas fight appears to have been easier to sign then Crawford vs Spence fight. The WBA who has Ugas as their welterweight champion was mandated to fight contender Emantas Stanionis and had initially rejected a unification fight between Ugas vs. Spence. Because an agreement was reached with Stanionis for him to “step aside” that will allow Spence vs. Ugas to meet in a showdown for a WBA/WBC/IBF welterweight unification. Is it a foregone conclusion that Spence will defeat Ugas? Nothing is certain in life or boxing for that matter. It seemed a foregone conclusion that Pacquiao would defeat Ugas when he replaced the injured Spence last August. Ugas pulled off an upset and defeated Pacquiao. Many are picking Spence to defeat Ugas, which if Spence does will not be easy. Ugas is 12-1 since 2019. Some argue Ugas should be 13-0 since his last defeat in 2014 because many had him defeating Shawn Porter in their match for the WBC welterweight title unanimously, but Ugas was controversially not awarded the decision. When Porter fought Spence, Porter lost by a split decision with 2 out of 3 judges scoring the fight for Spence, and 1 judge in favor of Porter. Crawford defeated Porter by a 10th round stoppage. A common opponent (Porter) for Crawford and Spence at the end of the proverbial day means nothing until both fighters get in the ring and actually face each other because “styles make fights” as the expression goes. Spence is opting not to take a tune up fight and go straight to a an elite fighter, Ugas, the same way he did after he recovered from a car injury in 2019 and returned to defeat former champion Danny Garcia. Ugas is a lot better than his professional record (27-4, 12KOs). If Ugas wasn’t better than his record he would not be in the position he is in today which is on the threshold of welterweight supremacy, unifying the welterweight division. Ugas will be the toughest fighter Spence has faced in his professional career. Ugas has been waiting for this opportunity for a long time and will do everything he can to continue winning. Ugas clearly fears no man in the welterweight division. If Ugas defeats Spence there is no doubt that Ugas will move forward to try and become the first undisputed 4 belt champion at welterweight (WBA/WBC/WBO IBF) as well as the first Cuban fighter to accomplish that and make millions of dollars in the process. So if Ugas can defeat Spence look for Crawford vs Ugas in June or July 2022. Contact Writer: RLubsboxing@aol.com Boxing Notes Would all the fighters from 160lbs to 175lbs “chill out”, as the expression goes in regards to challenging Canelo Alvarez to a fight? Canelo and his team are no doubt looking at all opponents in those 3 divisions as possible opponents whether or not he fights at cruiserweight. Canelo will fight who he wants to fight and when he wants to fight because he is the “A side”. Challengers, your job is to keep winning so that the Canelo’s team can reach out to you an offer the fight, if they so choose. Most importantly you can PRAY that you get the fight. Taunting Canelo to a fight is likely not going to get you the fight…Teofimo Lopez lost his lightweight titles to George Kambosos. Lopez had only 15 professional fights when he defeated Richard Commey for the IBF lightweight title. He won a close decision against an injured Vasily Lomenchenko to unify the title only to lose it in his first defense. There were reports Lopez was injured going into the Kambosos fight and he had trouble making the lightweight limit of 135lbs. When Lopez returns in 2022 it may not be a bad idea to take at least 2 tune up fights to build his confidence before challenging for a world title at 140lbs…The Boxing world desperately wanted to see Joshua vs. Wilder. That was easily have been a 100million dollar fight in Wembly stadium in Europe. Unable to come to an agreement between the two camps, both fighters eventually lost twice. Joshua to Ruiz. Joshua then defeated Ruiz in a rematch, but again lost to Usyk. Wilder would go on to lose to Fury Twice. Hope Boxing Promoters can learn from this and sign the big fights while there is still Fan interest, fighters remain undefeated, are not injured, or abruptly retire…It may NOT be a bad idea for David Benavidez to move up to light heavyweight. Benavidez vs. Gliberto Ramirez would be an excellent fight! Both fighters are former 168lbs champions and in their prime. Benavidez will likely not secure a fight against Canelo as he is looking to fight at Cruiserweight. If both Benavidez and Ramirez were to unify the light heavyweight division that would bring back the excitement that the division had when Michael Spinks dominated the division before moving up to challenge Larry Holmes… ***Ralph Rimpell is a writer based out of New York and is a Boxing Correspondent for Philboxing.com. Ralph holds an undergraduate degree from City University of New York. He has been a Boxing Writer for over ten years having written for several top boxing websites on the World Wide Web. Before becoming a writer, Ralph's passion was for professional wrestling until he realized professional wrestling was entertainment and not a real sport. It was at that time the 1984 US Olympic team made up of future stars such as Evander Holyfield, Meldrick Taylor, Pernell Whitaker, etc. entered the professional ranks and signed with promotional outfit Main Events.It was also at that time a young exciting Heavyweight originally hailing from Brooklyn named Mike Tyson also turned professional and became the face of boxing. Young boxing fan Ralph just couldn't get enough of boxing as a large part of it was being broadcast on "free TV". As time went on, Ralph felt boxing writers were not being forthcoming with their boxing coverage, opinion pieces, interviews, etc. So Ralph decided to write an article and submitted it to a Boxing website thinking it would be deleted and ignored by the Editor. To Ralph's surprise his article was posted on their website and the readers embraced it. The rest is history. "I thank God for the Internet because it has created opportunities for writers like myself who likely would not have been given an opportunity to write for print publications. I hope someday soon to expand my role in Boxing on different levels." -- Ralph Rimpell Click here to view a list of other articles written by Ralph Rimpell.  |
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